one day i'll see you smile
by princess estellise
Summary: You've always been a little unhappy. - Chase and Hikari, about divorce.


_one day i'll see you smile_

. .

( you've always been a little unhappy - chase and hikari, about his divorce. )

**notes**: not really sure where this came from, actually. i wanted to write about chase and this is what came out. it's probably a different view of his character entirely, but i've always thought he had sort of an attitude, so. i'm really sorry to the chase/maya fans, i guess?

**disclaimed.**

.

.

"She's a sweet girl," Hikari says absentmindedly, drumming her fingers on the counter and counting the seconds it takes for Chase to stop laughing like the angry little shit he is. She tilts her head upwards and catches his eye, cocking an unamused brow. "She _is_, Chase. She's a good friend of mine." Hikari's eyes flash in a warning, but Chase closes his eyes and pinches the bridge of his nose, ignoring it.

"I don't want to talk about this," he says after a brief silence. He exhales deeply, steadying himself on the column that juts from the floor to the ceiling.

"Oh?" Hikari's brows climb upwards until they're under her bangs. "You dragged me here to tell me you intend to divorce your wife and now you don't want to talk about it?"

"Shut up," Chase snaps, glaring at her now, "fucking - shut up for a second, will you? Stop talking like you know everything. You don't know anything about this." He seems a little less on-edge after his outburst, but clearly still on the defensive. Hikari isn't sure how to move forward from here without stepping on a thousand different landmines.

Finally, she settles on asking, "What do you want from me?"

Chase quiets, thinks about it for a moment. He lets out a breath, shakes his head almost imperceptibly. "Tell me it's okay," he says after a long moment, "tell me it's going to be okay. Or tell me to stick it out. Tell me I'm making a mistake. Just - tell me. _Something_." His voice is borderline desperate, but he conceals it well, despite what this is.

"Chase," Hikari says softly, a little sadly. She steels herself, gives a firm shake of her head. "I don't know what to say."

"No one does," he answers bitterly. He turns his back to her, stares hard at the stove. Hikari watches his shirt tighten over the slope of his shoulders, the tension in the fabric reminiscent of the tension in his body, of the atmosphere. "I'm so - " he starts, cutting himself off.

"Unhappy," Hikari supplies with a sigh, "but you've always been a little unhappy, Chase. Maybe it isn't her."

"She _should_ make me happy, though, shouldn't she? She should, but she doesn't." He sounds a bit like he's trying to convince himself. Hikari lets him. "I swear, Hikari, she doesn't even love me. She loves my food."

Hikari laughs despite herself, rights herself as soon as Chase shoots her an accusatory glare.

"It's sad, though, isn't it? That she doesn't want me as much as she wants me to cook for her?"

"You're a good cook, to be fair," Hikari says, maybe hoping to smooth things over, "you make the best risotto I've ever tasted."

"This isn't about my _risotto_, Hikari," he snaps, "my marriage is failing and I - I'm so - " Chase stops himself, biting so hard on his bottom lip that Hikari fears he might draw blood, "I'm so fucking tired, Hikari. I'm tired all the time. I'm tired of pretending things are okay when they _aren't_." His shoulders are shaking with the effort of keeping everything drawn inside of him. Hikari wants to reach for him but doesn't, keeps her hands firmly in her lap. "I thought you could help me," he finally admits, shaking his head, "I thought you could fix this."

Hikari sucks in a breath, almost chokes on it. "Why me? We're not - we're hardly friends, Chase."

"I don't know," Chase responds, laughing to himself, humorless, "you've fixed everything else. You - can fix things. It was stupid of me to think that you could solve my problems, too, but I wanted it so badly to just - to disappear. To repair itself."

Hikari stares down at her reflection in the counter, frowns at herself. He's right - she does fix things. She solves problems, creates new beginnings, but. She doesn't know how to fix this for him.

"Sometimes," she starts, choosing her words carefully, "you have to repair things yourself. _You_ have to work to make them better."

"I feel like I've been working so hard," Chase says, unable to stop his voice from cracking, "I feel like I'm trapped and I can't - I can't - "

"Then you have to leave her," Hikari says, breathing out slowly. She doesn't meet his eyes, not even when his breath catches. "There are some things you can't fix without breaking something else. So just - let it lie. Leave, if that's what you feel you have to do." She finally glances up at him, studies him carefully. His eyes are wide and his lips are tilted downwards, brows furrowed in bemusement.

"You're - you're telling me to go through with it?" He asks slowly, tiptoeing around his words like they're bombs.

"That's - that's up to you," Hikari says, standing up from the stool, "I can't tell you what to do. I won't. But you need to think about this before you jump into something you can't get out of."

Chase breathes out through his nose, clenching his fists. "I'm going to hurt her."

"Maybe that's better than hurting yourself," Hikari says, lingering at the door, "Chase, please don't - don't do this if you don't think it'll fix anything."

Chase squeezes his eyes shut. "It won't fix everything. But - but it'll be a start."

Hikari smiles at him but her eyes are sad. She leaves without another word, wonders if she said the right things.


End file.
